Laundry blue



NTTED STATES PATENT FFICE.

JAMES \VILLIAM FULLER, OF ST. PAUL, MINNESOTA.

LAUNDRY BLUE.

SPECIFICATION forming part of Letters Patent No. 553,556, dated January 28, 1898.

Application filed May 21, 1894. Serial No. 511,990. (N0 sp im To all whom, it may concern.-

Be it known that I, JAMES WILLIAM FULLER, a citizen of the United States, residing at St. Paul, county of Ramsey, and State of Minnesota,have invented a new and useful Improvement in Methods of Reducing the Soluble Blue of Commerce into Tablet Form, of which the following is a specification.

This invention relates to laundry. blue, and has for its object to prevent waste of material, facilitate its handling, determine the measure of quantity for any given amount of work to be done, and increase its working capacity, thereby reducing the cost of this article to a mere nominal figure.

The following causes, among others, have heretofore operated against its economical use by the consumer: Sold in liquid form, the blue has to be bottled, corked, carefully packed and shipped at a heavy expense, occupying, too, more space than is necessary for.

transportation and storage. In cold climates its use is almost impracticable, because of its liability to freeze, causing the breaking of bottles and loss of their contents. Sold and shipped in powdered form, the boxes containing it have to be supplied with specially-prepared sifting-covers. The very handling and use of it in this form lead to Waste of substance. Sold and shipped in a solid bulky form in the shape of balls or cakes a percentage of the blue is lost by friction, causing the substance to powder. or break to pieces in course of transportation or careless handling of same, and when the blue finally reaches the consumer it has to be handled and used in bags of cloth to hold the solid substance while dipped and agitated in the water to be blued, and these bags have to be thrown away every time a new ball or cake is required. Another percentage is wasted in the way of absorption by and escape of the blue from the bagswhen laid aside in a dripping wet condition. All this waste of material, labor and time, slight though it may be, considered in the aggregate, will amount to large proportions, in time, and cannot be ignored; but the most objectionable feature of the handling and use of the blue in any of the forms heretofore used consists in the failure and uncertainty in fixing the exact measure of the quantity of blue necessary for any given tity of soluble blue as found (preferably that known in the market as Prussian blue, having ferrocyanide of iron for its base) with oxalic acid and yellow prussiate of potassium, each of said ingredients to be used in powdered form and equal parts in weight, and when so mixed I moisten the same with a weak solution of gum-arabic, gumtragacanth, or similar substances, in sufficient quantity to enable me to knead the substances into a tough plastic mass of material, which, while in a moist condition, I granulate by forcing the same through a sieve, thereby producing granules of uniform size, which in a dry state are pressed by means of a tablet-machine or compressing device in common use for simi.

lar purposes into small tablets of circular form and about seven-sixteenths of an inch in diameter by one-sixteenth of an inch in depth.

Experiments with and actual use of my tablets have established the fact that one tablet of the size specified supplies a sufficient quantity of blue for one ordinary family washin g, thus establishing a basis of measurement fixed and certain of the quantity of blue necessary for any given amount of Washing to be done, small or large, thus solving the problem of economical use. The simple dropping of a tablet into a cup of water settles the necessary quantity of blue required for an ordinary washing. For a larger onethe number of tablets may be increased to suit the occasion, regard being had to the fact that a small, hard, smooth, light, fiat tablet causes less powdering by friction in transportation and at the same time is cleaner, more practical and convenient for the consumer to handle. I do not wish to be confined, however, to the exact form and proportion of my tablets. They .may, if preferred, be enlarged to meet, in a single tablet, the demands of a larger washing, the chief object of my invention being to establish a popular form of use of laundry-blue in the shape of a tablet, or any other suitable form, embodying a sufficient quantity of blue to supply the demands of one ordinary family Washing.

The tablets being dry are placed in small square boxes holding one hundred each ready for use.

The merits of my invention then, briefly stated, consist in so utilizing the coloring property of soluble blue, as found, by a process of concentration into the form specified,

so that instead of lessening or impairing its Working capacity as such increases it to an extent never thought of before, thus effecting a saving to the consumer of more than one hundred per cent. in the outlay for an article of necessity in every household, a fact easily demonstrated by comparison.

For precisely the same outlaythat is, for ten cents paid for blue in liquid form, sold in pint bottles, lasting for ordinary family Washing a period not exceeding three months- I make it possible for the consumer to do such ordinary family Washing for a period of twenty-four months, or two years, by using the blue in concentrated form, such as described. In other Words, at the rate of one tablet sufficient for one Washing I make a box of tablets containing one hundred supply sufficient blue for ahundred washings.

I claim as my invention The process of compressing the soluble blue of commerce into the solid form of tablets, consisting in the following method and means to carry the same into elfectzmixing Prussian blue with oxalic acid and yellow prussiate of potassium, all in powdered form and equal parts in Weight; moistening the substances, thus mixed, With a Weak solution of gum arabic; kneading it into a tough plastic mass of material; forcing the same through a sieve to form granules of uniform size, which in a thoroughly dry state are compressed into tablets of the size described, and, for the purpose set forth.

In testimony whereof I have hereunto set my hand in presence of two subscribing Wit- HGSSGS.

JAMES WILLIAM FULLER. \Vitnesses:

LoUIs FnEsER, J12, F. A. ELDREDGE. 

